“You have a one-track mind.”
“All Kate, all the time,” he says and it warms me. Although it’s a different warm than I get watching the man exert his power over simple things. I’m starting to realize there’s more than one way he causes a rise in my body temperature.
I put my hand over his on the shifter. “Thank you for coming with me.”
He nods. “Thank you for taking me.”
I sit atop the long marble double sink countertop in the bathroom swinging my legs, watching him get ready. “Did you play sports in high school? Seeing him with my brother made me imagine what he was like in high school.
“Yes. You?”
“Soccer.”
“Football.”
“Was your girlfriend a cheerleader?”
He smiles. “Cliché, huh?”
“I might’ve tried out to be a cheerleader instead of playing soccer if you were at my school.”
“I wouldn’t have went out with the cheerleaders if you were at my school.”
“Ssss,” I make a hissing sound and he furrows his brow. “You said cheerleaders, not cheerleader … as in, you went out with more than one.”
He finishes brushing his teeth and kisses me chastely on the lips. “Let’s not have this conversation.”
“Why not? It’s harmless. We’re talking about high school.”
“Yes, but I’d rather not talk about either one of us dating anyone else right now.” He lifts me from the sink and I oblige him, wrapping my legs around his waist. I flip off the light switch as we pass through to his bedroom.
“Cooper,” I whisper as he rests me gently on the bed and buries his face in my neck. He pulls his head back to look at me. “Make love to me.”
His eyes roam my face and he kisses me softly. Then he slowly makes love to me with the same domineering possessiveness that he always has. Only, this time it’s sweet and filled with heartfelt emotion.
It’s almost one in the morning by the time we’ve both quenched our desire. “Do you know why I wanted to bring you there tonight? To meet Mom and Kyle?” I say as I snuggle into the crook of his arm, fully sated.
“To show me why you’re doing the show?”
I should have known Cooper would see right through my thinly veiled plan to remind him why he needs to have patience with me when things get harder during the taping of the final four. “Did it work?”
“I already knew why you were doing the show.”
“I thought maybe it would make it easier to see the reason. Telling you what I’m working for doesn’t have the same effect. Making it to the end will go a long way for them. I would be able to almost fully pay off my mother’s mortgage and cover Kyle’s therapy while I finish school.”
“I can certainly appreciate your determination more. But if we’re being honest, nothing is going to make it easier to see you going out on romantic dates with another man.” He kisses the top of my head. “Although it means a lot that you tried.”
There’s a long silence and I start to think he’s fallen asleep. “Go away with me while you’re on hiatus?”
The question is unexpected. “Where?”
“My house in Barbados.”
“The house we’re going to stay at when we film?”
“I want you all to myself until then. Plus, I need to have you all over the island so there isn’t one place that you could sit with him and not remember me coaxing an orgasm from your body.”
I certainly don’t object to a marathon of orgasms on a tropical island. “I have to work tonight. But then I’m all yours.”
“Good. We leave tomorrow morning.”
I laugh. “You’ve already made the plans before asking me, haven’t you?”
“I did.”
“What would have happened if I would have said no?”
“You didn’t, did you?”
“That’s not the point.”
“I suppose I would have had to change your mind.”
“Let me guess, you’d screw me into submission.”
“You make it sound like it’s a bad thing.”
“It’s not a bad thing. It’s not a thing at all. You couldn’t make me change my mind by having sex with me if I really didn’t want to do something.”
“Then I’d have to use my mouth on you if my cock didn’t work.”
“You’re totally not getting what I’m trying to say.”
“Let’s try out your theory, shall we?” My exhausted body shudders at the challenge in his voice.
“I’m too tired.”
“Are you?” He flips me on my back and is above me, his mouth sucking my nipple in deeply, before I can even object. I am exhausted, but my traitorous body reacts anyway.
Forty-five minutes and two orgasms later, I drift off, thinking I might need to say no more often, just to get him to change my mind.
chapter twenty-eight
Cooper
The first thing I notice as I step foot into the casino is the costume the dealers are wearing. It’s basically little more than lingerie. In their red corsets and short black skirts, they look more like they belong at Hugh Heffner’s mansion than at a casino about to deal cards. I follow the sign to the high-stakes room with renewed purpose in my step.
It’s six in the morning, so the only people still playing cards are the degenerate gamblers and the drunks. Both appear to be at Kate’s table as I approach.
She watches me intently as I take a seat and pull my billfold from my pocket.
“Cash in.” She lays out my ten one-hundred-dollar bills on the felt table and turns to a suit, who nods.
“What can I get for you this morning, sir?” She arches an eyebrow and, just like the first time I met her, my damn dick twitches in my pants.
“Whatever you want to give me.” No one at the table notices our exchange. There’s four players, an old guy wearing a thick gold bracelet and four different diamond rings, and a group of three drunk young people who may have gotten in using fake IDs.
She pushes a stack of chips in my direction and smiles. “Good luck, sir.” Another damn twitch.
She deals the first hand and I win. “Looks like you’re lucky this morning.”
“Maybe it’s the dealer bringing me luck.”
She deals another hand. “Hmmm … well you better hope not. I’m off in twenty minutes.”
I win again, but the old guy loses his last stack of chips. He throws down his cards and leaves the table, muttering something about assholes and luck.
“So are you going to say yes if he proposes?” The tall blonde sways as she takes a drink from the waitress. She hasn’t anted up yet and Kate is holding the next deal to give her time to pile her chips in the circle.
Kate’s eyes flash quickly to me and then back to Swaying Blonde. Laying her hand on the table next to the empty circle, Kate politely asks, “Will you be sitting this one out?”
Drunk Guy pipes in, “Shut up about the bachelor asshole already and play cards. She already told you an hour ago she can’t talk about the show.” I prefer Dickhead, but asshole works too.
Swaying Blonde stacks a pile of black chips, not even flinching when she loses a thousand-dollar hand. I’d bet my bank balance it’s Daddy’s money. “She said she can’t talk about it. But maybe she can nod or something.”
“I don’t get your obsession with that guy anyway. He’s a scrawny poser.”
“He is not a scrawny poser.”
Drunk Guy shrugs. “Whatever. Ante up and pay attention to your cards.”
The table falls silent and I win another two hands. Five in a row, it has to be a record for me. Kate smiles as she pays the last win. “Looks like your luck keeps getting better today.”
“I hope so. I’m hoping to get lucky trying my hand at something new this afternoon,” I say cryptically.